Sermon
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Feast of the Annunciation
Today
we celebrate the Feast of the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary, one of the major
feast days of the church year. In our
parish, we have a large and beautiful icon of this feastday over the altar of
the church. We see the Archangel Gabriel
making the announcement to the Virgin Mary that God had chosen her to be the
vessel through which the Incarnate Word of God would take on flesh, become a
human being, and save the fallen human race.
And opposite of the Angel, we see the Virgin Mary, bowing her head in
humility and obedience to the announcement of the Angel, and we see the Holy
Spirit, shown symbolically by a dove surrounded with a radiance of grace, enter
into the Virgin Mary, for the Incarnation is an Immaculate one, as we recite in
the Creed, regarding the Word of God, “who for us and for our salvation, came
down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and
became man.”
This feast of the Annunciation marks the opening of a new chapter, the third chapter in the history of the human race, the chapter of redemption. The first chapter is the creation of the world. One God, in three persons, created the world. That means that the Father, the Word (who would later become Incarnate Son), and the Holy Spirit all participated in the Creation of the World. The Creation was done out of love. God, out of His overabundance of love, wanted to created a world with which to share that love.
The crowning jewel of God’s creation was the human being. God made man in His image and likeness and placed him in a garden of paradise. The name of man was Adam. The name of the woman created to be his helpmate was Eve. In the second chapter of history, the Fall, Adam and Eve fell from their state of perfection by eating the fruit of a forbidden tree in the garden. Their first sin was pride, their second disobedience and their third sin was dishonesty. And the penalty of their sin was banishment from the garden, hardship, death, disgrace. After all, what is disgrace, but the loss of grace, in this case, God’s grace, that had allowed them to live in perfect union with God. The banishment from the Garden of Eden was upheld by an Angel holding a fiery sword, guarding the gate to paradise, so that man could not again return to that state of grace he had once enjoyed.
The
story of the creation and the fall of humanity is told in the opening chapters
of the book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible. The story is told in a way that a small child
can understand. Many adults,
unfortunately, dismiss this story from the Bible as something only for
children, after all, hasn’t science debunked a seven-day creation? And, if Adam and Eve had only sons, how did
the human race expand?
Let’s
examine the story in a deeper way. II
Peter 3:8 says that “with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a
thousand years as one day.” Thus the
time of God and the time of man move at different speeds. What is written to be a seven day creation, something
a child can understand, literally could have taken millions of years, thus in
harmony with scientific theories on the creation of the world. What science, however, will never be able to
define, is what caused the first action, whatever that action was, to occur. The answer is: the hand of God caused the
first action, and so however the creation evolved to the way we relate to it
today, it began with the command and the hand of God. The word Adam means humanity. The word Eve means motherhood. That means that humanity and motherhood
combined to perpetuate the human race.
It does not mean that we should split hairs and argue how two people
named Adam and Eve could possibly be responsible for creating an entire human
race.
The
name of the garden of paradise was called
When
mankind was banished from paradise, the angel holding the fiery sword, is said
to be, according to Tradition, the Archangel Michael. He is portrayed on the icon screen on the
left side of every Orthodox Church, with the sword guarding the gate to paradise. During the liturgical services of the church,
processions of the priest or altar boys emanate from this door, symbolizing our
coming out of paradise. The door
opposite of Archangel Michael is Archangel Gabriel, who opens the door with the
new chapter inaugurated by the Annunciation.
That’s why when the priest censes around the church as he does during
Orthros or during Holy Week, that he exits the altar from the door of Archangel
Michael, but re-enters through the door of the Archangel Gabriel. For we came out of paradise through a door
guarded by the Archangel Michael. But we
have a chance to return to
The Virgin Mary, in most icons, is depicted in blue and red. Blue represents earth, red represents the heavenly. The symbolism is that Mary was born a person of the earth. And through her acceptance of God’s call, she not only opened the door to heaven, but through her life, she led the way. That’s why we all call her in some sense our mother, because like the good mother, she sets a good example and teaches us how to live by her example. She answers for mankind in the way that Adam should have answered. Where Adam was prideful, the Virgin Mary was humble. Where Adam was disobedient, the Virgin Mary was obedient—let it be to me according to your word. And where Adam was dishonest, the Virgin Mary was loyal, to the end. She became the humble servant to facilitate the Incarnation. She was the dutiful mother in child-birth, in child-hood, even to the foot of the cross. And she became the mother of the Christian church and thus the mother of all Christians when Christ entrusted her to the care of His beloved disciple, John. In telling her to “Behold your son,” in John 19:26, He was telling her to safeguard the Apostles, the founders of the church, and by extension, to look out for all the members of the church as her own children. In telling His disciple John to “behold your mother in John 19:27, he is telling us to look at the Virgin Mary as our own mother, to show her love, respect, obedience and humility, as we should to our own mothers. For like the good mother, she truly cares for all of us.
Tradition holds that the Virgin Mary was probably no more than 14 years old when she was visited by the Archangel Gabriel. Gabriel addressed the Virgin Mary with a salutation, “Rejoice,” which is the reverse of the pain and sorrow that marked man’s life and man’s relation to God after the Fall. And with that announcement, a new chapter was opened. It was no longer a time of broken-ness, fallen-ness, or hopelessness, but a new era of hope was about to begin. The chapter would have indeed been a short one, had it not been for Mary’s response of obedience and humility, “Behold, I am the handmaiden of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word.” (Luke 1:38) Thus her role in the history of salvation is of extreme importance, because without a vessel through which to enter the world, how could God become like a man, and consequently, how can a man become like God.
The
word Annunciation in English means to make an announcement. But this announcement is more than just any
announcement. In Greek, the word for today’s
feast is Evangelismos, from which we get the word Evangelio, which we translate
as the Gospel, but is more correctly translated as “the Good News.” So today’s feast of the Annunciation is the
feast of the Good News. Indeed it is
good news. The Icon of the Annunciation,
or of the announcement of the Good news, is both on the royal doors and over
them, to show that paradise is again opened, to those who believe, to those who
obey, to those who are humble, and to those who with joy and preparation, approach
to commune with God. And this good news
demands a response—it demands to be shared, it demands to be the cause of joy.
We are one week away from Holy Week. When we gather next Sunday, this annual journey will already have begun. Some have not taken much away from Lent thus far. And the good news on that subject is that the most important part of the journey is yet to come. Again, walking through the Passion of Christ, again relearning the theology of the church, again walking through the events surrounding the Passion of Christ—the entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, the agony in the garden, the betrayal, the trial, the torture, the crucifixion, the death, the burial, and ultimately the third-day Resurrection. On my calendar this week, there is no time off, just a busy schedule of trying to get as much done as possible, so that I can take the energy used on the normal workload this week, and channel it into my Holy Week journey this year. I encourage you to take time this week to prepare, get ahead on work or sleep, make a game plan for yourself so that you can participate as much as possible in the Holy Week journey. It you think you can manage it, try to come to each of night of Holy Week. Look deep within yourself, and make that commitment. And I can almost guarantee that if you are able to make and to meet that commitment, not only will have a Holy Week like none other in your life, but in two weeks when sing Christ is Risen, you will have had a more joyful and meaningful journey through Holy Week than you have in the past.
We have completed five weeks of a Lenten journey. The most important part waits ahead of us. With the MOST critical part happening two weeks from today—which is NOT Christ is Risen, hooray let’s eat well again, but rather Christ is Risen and how will that effect my life, how will that change me for the better. The Virgin Mary received Good News from an angel and it profoundly affected her, it changed her whole life. We hear that story today, and we are about to receive our Good news again in two short weeks. How will that affect our lives? Will it change us? Will we approach God with the humility and obedience of Mary—let it be to us according to your word, we are the servants of the Lord!? I certainly hope so.
Mary was an improbable person to be the bearer of God. A young girl, from a small and obscure town, she was entrusted with the good news. There is a message in that as well. Each of us, whether we are educated or not, whether we are rich or poor, whether we were born in Greece, or Romania, or America or anywhere else, whether we are single or married—whoever we are, whatever we do, we too, are each called by God. We are called to “rejoice,” just like the Virgin Mary. We are called “Highly favored,” just like her, after all God sent His Son to save us, not the animals, not the trees. And God created us in His image and likeness. This morning, the Annunciation foreshadows the Incarnation, 9 months before the feast of Christmas, when we say that God became a man, so man can become like God. This is certainly good news, this is, in fact the best news, and it demands a response. It demands to be shared, and to be shared with enthusiasm, with zeal, with joy. It demands that our lives be changed, to conform not with what man calls us to be—bearers of knowledge, bearers of fame and fortune, pride and achievement—but rather what God calls us to be—bearers of God Himself. After all, the word Theotokos, which is one of the titles we use for the Virgin Mary, means God-bearer. And so in a sense, today’s feast day is not only for those named Evangelos and Evangelia, but it is a feast for everyone who desires to bear God within them, for everyone who accepts God with the humility and obedience demonstrated by the Virgin Mary.
I
want to close by reading the words of one of the hymns from the Orthros Service
this morning, which sums up the great meaning and significance of today’s feast
day: “Today is revealed the mystery that
has been kept from eternity, and the Son of God becomes the Son of man, so that
by partaking in what is lower He may impart to us what is superior. Of old, Adam was deceived; and he did not
become God, though this was his desire.
Now, though, does God become a man, so that He might cause Adam
(humanity) to become like God. Let
creation be joyful, and let nature be exultant.
For the